For all the ink spilled over Megan Fox's departure from the "Transformers" franchise, it's almost as if her name never left the marquee. Fresh anecdotes -- including a harsh directive that came from one of the most powerful men in Hollywood -- have again revived the controversy over her firing from the Michael Bay-helmed action flicks.

"She was in a different world, on her BlackBerry. You gotta stay focused. And you know, the Hitler thing. Steven [Spielberg] said, 'Fire her right now,'" Bay said in a recent interview.

The "Hitler thing" would be comments Fox made in British magazine Wonderland, saying Bay liked to run his set in the style of the aforementioned dictator.

"I wasn't hurt, because I know that's just Megan. Megan loves to get a response. And she does it in kind of the wrong way.

"I'm sorry, Megan. I'm sorry I made you work 12 hours. I'm sorry that I'm making you show up on time," Bay told GQ, which profiled him and many of his longtime collaborators, including current star Shia LaBeouf.

"Criticism is one thing," LaBeouf said of Fox. "Then there's public name-calling, which turns into high school bashing. Which you can't do. She started [smack]-talking our captain."

Earlier this month, LaBeouf went on about how Fox "never got comfortable" with her sex symbol status, or the methods Bay used to propel her there.

[Updated, 11:15 p.m. June 20: This post originally contained a picture mislabeled by the photo service as a shot of Steven Spielberg. It now contains a picture that's definitely Spielberg.]